US, Japan, discuss ‘growing threat’ as North Korea claims to have H-bomb warhead

Trump and Abe talk about upping pressure on Pyongyang amid fears that fresh nuclear test could be in the offing

In this undated image distributed on Sunday, September 3, 2017, by the North Korean government, shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at an undisclosed location. North Korea’s state media on Sunday, Sept 3, 2017, said Kim inspected the loading of a hydrogen bomb into a new intercontinental ballistic missile (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)

US President Donald Trump spoke Saturday with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan to discuss the “growing threat” posed by North Korea, which carried out two intercontinental ballistic missile tests in July.

“The two leaders reaffirmed the importance of close cooperation between the United States, Japan, and South Korea in the face of the growing threat from North Korea,” a White House readout of the call said.

The two discussed “ongoing efforts to maximize pressure on North Korea,” the statement read.

The statement did not say whether the conversation came before or after the North’s latest claim that its leader has inspected the loading of a hydrogen bomb into a new intercontinental ballistic missile.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un inspected a new, “super explosive” hydrogen bomb meant to be loaded into an intercontinental ballistic missile, Pyongyang’s state media said Sunday, a claim to technological mastery that some outside experts will doubt but that raises the possibility of an imminent nuclear bomb test.

Photos released by North Korea Sunday showed Kim talking with his lieutenants as he observed a silver, peanut-shaped device that was apparently the purported thermonuclear weapon destined for an ICBM.

In this undated image distributed on Sunday, September 3, 2017, by the North Korean government, shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at an undisclosed location. North Korea’s state media on Sunday, Sept 3, 2017, said Kim inspected the loading of a hydrogen bomb into a new intercontinental ballistic missile (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)

Aside from the factuality of the North’s claim, the language in its statement seems a strong signal that Pyongyang will soon conduct another nuclear weapon test, which is crucial if North Korean scientists are to fulfill the national goal of an arsenal of viable nuclear ICBMs that can reach the US mainland. There’s speculation that such a test could come on or around the September 9 anniversary of North Korea’s national founding, something it did last year.

As part of the North’s weapons work, Kim was said by his propaganda mavens to have made a visit to the Nuclear Weapons Institute and inspected a “homemade” H-bomb with “super explosive power” that “is adjustable from tens kiloton to hundreds (of) kiloton,” the state run Korean Central News Agency said.

A July 4, 2017 file photo, distributed by the North Korean government, shows what was said to be the launch of a Hwasong-14 intercontinental ballistic missile in North Korea. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP, File)

North Korea in July conducted its first ever ICBM tests, part of a stunning jump in progress for the country’s nuclear and missile program since Kim rose to power following his father’s death in late 2011. The North followed its two tests of ICBMs, which, when perfected, could target large parts of the United States, by threatening to launch a salvo of its Hwasong-12 intermediate range missiles toward the US Pacific island territory of Guam in August.

It flew a Hwasong-12 over northern Japan last week, the first such overflight by a missile capable of carrying nukes, in a launch Kim described as a “meaningful prelude” to containing Guam, the home of major US military facilities, and more ballistic missile tests targeting the Pacific.

The North said in its statement Sunday that its H-bomb “is a multi-functional thermonuclear nuke with great destructive power which can be detonated even at high altitudes for super-powerful EMP (electromagnetic pulse) attack according to strategic goals.”

Kim, according to the statement, claimed that “all components of the H-bomb were homemade … thus enabling the country to produce powerful nuclear weapons as many as it wants.”

In this undated image distributed on Sunday, September 3, 2017, by the North Korean government, shows North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at an undisclosed location. North Korea’s state media on Sunday, Sept 3, 2017, said Kim inspected the loading of a hydrogen bomb into a new intercontinental ballistic missile (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)

In what could be read as a veiled warning of more nuclear tests, Kim underlined the need for scientists to “dynamically conduct the campaign for successfully concluding the final-stage research and development for perfecting the state nuclear force” and “set forth tasks to be fulfilled in the research into nukes.”

To back up its bombast, North Korea needs to conduct nuclear tests. The first of its two such tests last year involved what it claimed was a hydrogen bomb; the second it said was its most powerful detonation ever. Experts and outside governments are skeptical of the hydrogen claim, but it is almost impossible to independently confirm North Korean statements about its highly secret weapons program.

It is clear, however, that each new missile and nuclear test gives the North invaluable information that allows big jumps in capability. A key question is how far North Korea has gotten in efforts to consistently shrink down nuclear warheads so they can fit on long-range missiles.

US President Donald Trump (R) and Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe shake hands during a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Hamburg, northern Germany, July 8, 2017.(AFP PHOTO / SAUL LOEB)

Sunday’s statement will like raise already high worries on the Korean Peninsula and in Washington that the North is closer to its goal of an arsenal of viable nuclear ICBMs that can reach the US mainland.

US President Donald Trump has warned Pyongyang that it faces a rain of “fire and fury,” and that Washington’s weapons are “locked and loaded.”

North Korea is thought to have a growing arsenal of nuclear bombs and has spent decades trying to perfect a multistage, long-range missile to eventually carry smaller versions of those bombs.

“Though we cannot verify the claim, (North Korea) wants us to believe that it can launch a thermonuclear strike now, if it is attacked. Importantly, (North Korea) will also want to test this warhead, probably at a larger yield, to demonstrate this capability,” said Adam Mount, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.

North Korea’s claim that “this warhead is variable-yield and capable of specialized weapons effects implies a complex nuclear strategy. It shows (North Korea) is not only threatening assured destruction of the US and allied cities in the event it is attacked, but also that (North Korea) is considering limited coercive nuclear strikes, or is seeking credible response options for US ones.”

South Korea’s main spy agency has previously asserted that it does not think Pyongyang currently has the ability to develop miniaturized nuclear weapons that can be mounted on long-range ballistic missiles. Some experts, however, think the North may have mastered this technology.

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